[Posted Sunday p.m.]
NBA Quiz: Short on time…so using a topic Johnny Mac brought to me the other day, minutes played per game. In 1961-62, while with the Warriors, Wilt Chamberlain averaged 48.52 minutes per game. How is this possible, you might be musing? Well there were 10 overtime contests, and we figure that Wilt didn’t play in about 8 minutes all season! This was the year he averaged 50.4 points per game, too.
Wilt holds the top seven minutes per game marks for a season, 46+ each year. But who is No. 8 on the list, the only other player at 46 (46.01). Hint: He played in 1972-73 and led the league in scoring that season. Answer below.
NFL
Atlanta vs. New England
What a [crappy] pair of games we had today…making it 8 of 10 during the playoffs thus far, in actuality.
But now it’s Matt Ryan, going for his first (and Atlanta’s first) Super Bowl title and immortality, versus Tom Brady, gunning for his record fifth, ditto mastermind coach Bill Belichick.
This of course sets up the possibility of a rather awkward Lombardi Trophy ceremony should Brady and the Pats win the Super Bowl, the trophy being presented by none other than Roger Goodell…primo asshole and the man who suspended Brady. Yup, that would be delicious. But a lot of us will be pulling for Matty Ice…Boston College grad and just a very good guy.
New England is an early 3-point favorite.
But looking at today’s games, the over/under, at least the last I saw on Packers-Falcons, was 60 and if you bet the over you were happy with the 44-21 Falcons win.
But if you were a pure football fan, you didn’t like how this one progressed, Atlanta jumping out to a fast 17-0 lead.
After Atlanta drove down the field for the first touchdown, the Packers went 52 yards, setting up kicker Mason Crosby for a 41-yarder and he missed, his first miss after 23 consecutive field goals in the postseason. Critical.
Atlanta then drove down for a field goal…10-0.
But Green Bay and Aaron Rodgers went 64 yards, only to have fullback Aaron Ripkowski fumble. Atlanta and Matt Ryan then scored to make it 17-0 and it was game over.
Two critical Pittsburgh mistakes cost them the game. Had they been able to reverse the two, it’s a totally different contest.
Matt Ryan had 271 yards passing in just the first half, plus two touchdown, while Aaron Rodgers was 12/17, 119, 0-1.
Ryan ended up 27/38, 392, 4-0, 139.4, as receiver Julio Jones was a monster…9 receptions for 180 yards and two scores. Rodgers was 27/45, 287, 3-1, but it was totally irrelevant.
In the nightcap, the Patriots got off to a 17-6 lead, 17-9 at the half, but then Tom Brady and Co. ripped off 16 unanswered to suddenly make it 33-9 and it was game over in this contest. Final…36-17.
New England receiver Chris Hogan, who had seven catches for 117 yards and two touchdowns in the first half, ended up with 9-180-2; the exact same numbers as Julio Jones.
Pittsburgh can complain, mildly, that Le’Veon Bell went out early with a groin injury, but that wasn’t the difference.
So now we have this interminable two-week wait for the Big Game. I will cover little of the run-up as it bores me to tears. But the storyline of Brady vs. Goodell is pretty, pretty good.
–The Colts fired general manager Ryan Grigson after five seasons, with owner Jim Irsay saying head coach Chuck Pagano would remain for 2017.
Irsay, who is a bit erratic, said, “It was gut, intuitive, instinct from looking at where we were and where we are as a franchise.”
Many thought Pagano should have been fired after missing the playoffs a second straight season.
Irsay quickly quelled speculation that Peyton Manning was returning to Indy, where he spent 14 seasons, to be the GM.
–On Thursday, the Oakland Raiders applied to relocate to Las Vegas. This will test the league, which has opposed sports gambling (outwardly) for decades, with the Raiders needing the approval of 24 of the 32 teams, with the earliest vote coming in late March.
But Cowboys owner Jerry Jones has been a vocal supporter of the move (ditto Robert Kraft). “The unique thing about Las Vegas is it’s a jewel for our country. It really can be a plus for the ‘wow’ factor and for the NFL,” said Jones.
–Vikings running back Adrian Peterson is a free agent and he’s mentioned he wouldn’t mind being on the Giants, Texans or Buccaneers, though his first choice is to remain in Minnesota. At the right price, the 31-year-old, despite all his injury problems, including a torn meniscus last season, could be worth a shot.
College Basketball
–Some scores of note, going back to Wednesday….
10 Florida State defeated 15 Notre Dame 83-80, as freshman sensation Jonathan Isaac had 23 points, 10 rebounds and 7 blocks. This kid is exploding right before our eyes…seemingly better each game. He might not be hanging around Tallahassee much longer.
7 West Virginia had a horrible loss at home to Oklahoma in overtime, 89-87, as the Mountaineers were just 18 of 29 from the free throw line.
And Wake Forest had a nice win, 96-79, at home against Miami behind John Collins’ 27 points.
Saturday….
1 Villanova is 19-1, 7-1, after defeating Providence 78-68, the Friars falling to 13-8, 3-5.
14 Arizona traveled to Los Angles to face 3 UCLA and handily defeated the Bruins, 96-85, as the Wildcats moved to 18-2, 7-0, while UCLA fell to 19-2, 6-2. It’s going to be interesting to see where the pollsters place these two now.
4 Gonzaga remains undefeated, 19-0, after a 73-52 win over Portland (9-10).
5 Kentucky easily handled 24 South Carolina (15-4, 5-1) 85-69 in Lexington as the Wildcats improved to 17-2, 7-0. The Gamecocks were trying to prove they belonged…they don’t.
Kentucky, though, lost starting guard De’Aaron Fox to a sprained ankle and it’s not known how long he’ll be out.
6 Baylor is now 18-1, 6-1, after a 62-53 win over TCU (14-5, 3-4).
7 Creighton lost a tough one at home to Marquette (13-6, 4-3) 102-94 as the Golden Eagles shot 60% from the field for the game! Good lord.
West Virginia, tied for 7th with Creighton, laid another egg Saturday, losing at Kansas State (15-4, 4-3) 79-75. The Mountaineers are now 15-4, 4-3, and they will plummet in the rankings after their poor week.
9 North Carolina is 18-3, 6-1, after a 90-82 victory at Boston College (9-11, 2-5), which I bring up only because B.C. handily beat the spread, and at the end of the day, boys and girls….the Eagles having a history with point spreads, too.
In a very good game, 10 Florida State advanced to 18-2, 6-1, after a 73-68 win at home vs. 12 Louisville (16-4, 4-3). The aforementioned Jonathan Isaac had 16 points, 10 rebounds. He did get a little out of control at times. Coach needs to rein him in just a tad or he could make some crucial mistakes in an NCAA tourney game.
And in Raleigh, my Wake Forest Demon Deacons won again, this one a biggie because it snapped a 25-game ACC winless streak on the road, a 93-88 victory over North Carolina State (13-7, 2-5), the Deacs now 12-7, 3-4.
I have been easy on Danny Manning this season, very patient, after blistering him the previous two years. There’s a reason for this. There has been a distinct change in his demeanor and while he has a little more talent, the more positive vibes are clearly translating into better play. You don’t have the sense of fear and doom that pervaded the Deacon bench in the past. Wake is finally turning the corner. We’ll be back in the NCAAs next year (as long as John Collins and Bryant Crawford stick around).
—Central Michigan guard Marcus Keene is the nation’s leading scorer, entering Saturday’s play with a 28.7 average.* But then the 5-9 guard went out on Saturday and erupted for 50 on 10 three-pointers in the Chippewas’ 101-92 win against Miami-Ohio, the most by any player in Division I this year. [Malik Monk had that great 47-point effort against North Carolina earlier.]
The last player to score 50 at this level was South Dakota State’s Nate Wolters (53) vs. IPFW in 2013.
*After Keene’s explosion Saturday, his average is up to 29.8.
–One other…Sunday, Seton Hall defeated St. John’s 86-73, which I only bring up because the Hall’s Angel Delgado had a rare 20/20 game…21 points, 20 rebounds. This guy is a definite at the next level.
–The Washington Post’s John Feinstein did a terrific piece on Digger Phelps and the 1971 Fordham Rams, who some of us from the area, and of a certain age, remember well. That season, the Rams, coached by 29-year-old Digger Phelps and with no starting player taller than 6-5, went 26-3, including a defeat of Notre Dame in Madison Square Garden before a sellout crowd of 19,500, and then lost two weeks later to second-ranked Marquette in overtime in front of another sellout crowd.
Fordham finished ninth in the regular season poll, while reaching the Sweet 16 of the NCAA tournament before losing to Howard Porter-led Villanova, which would fall to UCLA in the title game.
Feinstein recalls going to the Notre Dame and Marquette games, and I sure remember them.
As for Phelps, he was an assistant under Dick Harter at Penn, which was great in those days, but in the spring of 1970, Fordham’s athletic director took a flyer on Phelps.
“They had gone 10-15 the year before but had everyone back,” Phelps told Feinstein. “Plus, they had a guy coming up from the freshman team named Paul Griswold who was 6-9 and would give us the size that had been missing. I figured we’d go 15-10, make the NIT and go from there.”
But then Griswold hurt his knee in the fall so it was back to the small lineup. Phelps went with four guards…Charlie Yelverton, Kenny Charles, Billy Mainor and Jackie Burik. [I remember the first three.]
The Rams started off 12-0, lost to a good Temple team, and then beat Notre Dame. They became the darlings of the city. Howard Cosell was doing local radio back then (must-listening) and he began interviewing Phelps regularly.
But it was the Notre Dame game that really put Digger on the map. To say it was a fortuitous win is also an understatement. Fighting Irish coach Johnny Dee was rumored to be retiring and Phelps wanted the job. He got it…two months shy of his 30th birthday. Phelps then coached at ND for 20 years, winning 393 games and taking the Irish to the 1978 Final Four, plus that iconic win on Jan. 19, 1974, when Notre Dame ended UCLA’s historic 88-game winning streak.
Fordham was last in the NCAA tournament in 1992. They should have stayed in the Patriot League, but went to the A-10 and just have struggled to compete.
[Johnny Mac’s father was a 1936 Fordham grad, a class that included Vince Lombardi, Alex Wojciechowicz and Wellington Mara. I’ve been on campus a few times through my work with the Jesuits and it’s a cool place. I went to Cardinal Avery Dulles’ funeral there as well back in 2008, having been to Rome a few years earlier to see this great man elevated; a picture of the two of us then one of my 4 or 5 prized possessions. Me and Cardinal McCarrick as well. Now there was another great man…but I’m rambling and this has zero to do with college basketball.]
NBA
–In the Knicks’ 113-110 loss to the Wizards at the Garden on Wednesday, forward Courtney Lee received the ball in the left corner with seconds remaining, lining up his tying-3, when Lee said after:
“Then I see [Washington’s Kelly] Oubre in front of me, but right here I’m hearing, ‘I got your help, I’m right here, I’m right here.’ I come to find out it’s their coach standing next to me. I’m thinking he’s a player. So I drive and try to make a play. I don’t know if the league should look into that.”
It was Washington assistant Sidney Lowe, deliberately distracting Lee…with Lowe standing blatantly on the court! Nothing was called as the play broke down, the ball being fumbled away at the buzzer. Seriously, it was as if Washington had six players. It just summed up the Knicks’ season.
Which got worse Saturday night when Carmelo Anthony’s three-pointer for the win at the buzzer rimmed the basket and fell out…Knicks lose to the Suns 107-105.
Unbelievable. The 19-26 Knicks just this month have lost five games at the buzzer.
Clyde Frazier was great last night. Before Anthony’s last attempt…“It’s déjà vu all over again!” After Anthony’s shot went in and out….“It’s déjà vu all over again!”
—Nice win for San Antonio at Cleveland Saturday night, 118-115, as Kawhi Leonard went off for 41. The Spurs are now 34-9, while the Cavs at 30-12 have been just so-so recently, 5-5 their last ten.
—Russell Westbrook is averaging a triple-double (30.6 ppg, 10.6 reb, 10.4 assists), yet he won’t be starting in the All-Star Game. Stephen Curry and James Harden beat him out, and it’s the fans fault.
In a new voting system in which the fans, players and the media all get a portion of the vote, Westbrook was first among the players and media, but third in the tiebreaking fan vote, more than 200,000 votes behind both Curry and Harden.
It was a rough 24-hour period for Westbrook, who in a loss against the Warriors had a particularly egregious traveling violation (comical, really) in a loss against Golden State.
Westbrook is attempting to become the first since Oscar Robertson in 1961-62 to average a triple-double for a season.
The Eastern Conference starters are LeBron James, Kyrie Irving, Jimmy Butler, Bucks phenom Giannis Antetokounmpo and DeMar DeRozan.
The Western Conference starters, aside from Curry and Harden, are Kevin Durant, Kawhi Leonard and Anthony Davis.
Ask me if I’ll watch a second of NBA All-Star weekend. Go ahead…ask me.
Australian Open
With the time difference, it’s always hard to keep up with things at tennis’ first major, but on Sunday, No.1-seed Andy Murray was upset in the fourth round by 50th-ranked Mischa Zverev in four sets. This follows the second-round departure of six-time defending champion Novak Djokovic, beaten by a wild-card entry, Denis Istomin, who was ranked 117 in the world. [After four consecutive grand slams between 2015 and 2016, Djokovic has now gone three tournaments without adding to his tally of 12 major triumphs.]
It’s the first time since 2002 that the top two seeds haven’t reached the Australian Open quarterfinals, and the first time at a Grand Slam since the French Open in 2004.
So Zverev will now face 17-time major winner Roger Federer, who in his return from injury, bested No. 5 Kei Nishikori in five sets today.
In one of the other quarterfinals, U.S. Open champion Stan Wawrinka will play against Jo-Wilfried Tsonga. Rafael Nadal is also still in contention.
On the women’s side, Venus Williams, playing her best tennis in years, advanced to the quarterfinals, and it’s now possible she could face off in the finals against her sister, Serena, who advanced to the quarters as I post, especially after No. 1-seed Angelique Kerber lost on Sunday to unseeded 25-year-old Coco Vandeweghe of New York City! [I didn’t know she was from here.]
–200th-ranked qualifier Noah Rubin from Long Island, who played one year at Wake Forest before turning pro, played admirably against Federer in the second round, before succumbing 7-5, 6-3, 7-6 (3) on Wednesday.
Golf Balls
–Just ten days after Justin Thomas became the seventh golfer in PGA Tour history to shoot 59 at the Sony Open, Canadian Adam Hadwin did so himself at the CareerBuilder Challenge in La Quinta, Calif., the old Bob Hope event. Hadwin had 13 birdies, tying a record for a round held by Chip Beck when he fired a 59.
So with this stunning performance, Hadwin had a one-shot lead heading into the final round, having never won on Tour, but he lost by one to Hudson Swafford, his first Tour victory. At least Hadwin was a solo second. [Huge money difference.]
But picture Swafford’s caddie, who I’m sure will receive the standard 10% for carrying the winner’s bag. The guy looked more thrilled than Hudson this afternoon.
Swafford, when asked after how difficult it was to win his first Tour title said, “They don’t give them away.” That’s for sure.
–England’s Tommy Fleetwood won his second European Tour title in Dubai at the Abu Dhabi Championship, with Dustin Johnson T-2. Fleetwood is now in line (though not a certainty, if I’m reading things right) for his first Masters…a tradition unlike any other…on CBS.
–On the Champions Tour, 59-year-old Bernhard Langer won his 30th career title, second to Hale Irwin’s 45, in Hawaii, but I need to get a better handle on what happened. Play was suspended on Saturday due to high winds, and with the forecast for Sunday just as bad (gusts of 45 mph), Langer was declared the winner.
–Lastly, you know I read a lot…a ton of sources…but I’m forgetting where I read that Costco golf balls have been selling out. Yes, Costco brand golf balls. The reason? A lot of people are saying they perform just as well as some far pricier models so you may want to check this out. I’m serious.
MLB
–The Hall of Fame vote came in after I posted last time so I need to get a few things down for the record. Three got the requisite 75 percent.
Jeff Bagwell…86.2%…7th year
Tim Raines…86.0…10th and last
Ivan Rodriguez…76.0%…1st
Trevor Hoffman…74.0…2nd
Vladimir Guerrero 71.7%…1st
Edgar Martinez…58.6%…8th
Roger Clemens…54.1%…5th
Barry Bonds…53.8%…5th
Mike Mussina…51.8%…4th
Curt Schilling…45.0%…down from 52.3%*…5th
Lee Smith …34.2%…his eligibility is over
Manny Ramirez…23.8%…1st
Fred McGriff…21.7%…9th
Jorge Posada…3.8%…1st…but didn’t get required 5% to stay on the ballot.
Hoffman and Guerrero will get in next year.
*As the New York Post’s Ken Davidoff put it, “Schilling clearly paid a heavy price for publicly tweeting an image that expressed a desire to see journalists lynched. Will that be a one-year condemnation, or has Schilling, in his fourth year, inflicted serious damage on his candidacy? Next year should provide a solid answer.” Though Schilling on Saturday was then blasting the women’s marches. He’s Hall worthy…and also an idiot.
Jeff Bagwell’s progression from 2015 (55.7%) to 71.6% last year and then 86.2% was a clear example of the rapidly changing attitudes that will propel Bonds and Clemens.
As for Tim Raines, the admitted cocaine abuser, he was still the second-best leadoff hitter in baseball history (to Rickey Henderson)….and the only player in history with at least 100 triples, 150 homers and 600 stolen bases.
I frankly have grown weary of the Hall of Fame debate. I’m tired of screaming about Bonds and Clemens. This was also the year that the debate about what Cooperstown really is…a museum or shrine…has been crystallized. I have to admit, I never really thought of the Hall in those terms. I mean I viewed it as both; a shrine that I’ve also called, after my visits there, one of the best museums of any kind in the world. [Ditto the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, even though I hate the voting process for enshrinement there.]
When you walk through the grand hall in Cooperstown and see the plaques of Ruth, Gehrig, Mathewson and Johnson, you get the sense it’s a true shrine. But it is a museum.
George F. Will / Washington Post
“Many Americans are more thoughtful when choosing appliances than when choosing presidents, but the baseball writers whose ballots decide who is ‘enshrined’ – more about that verb anon – in Cooperstown’s Hall of Fame are mostly conscientious voters struggling to unravel a knotty puzzle: how to treat retired players who are known or suspected to have used performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs) while compiling gaudy numbers….
“On Wednesday, two highly probable users, Roger Clemens and Barry Bonds, reached 54.1 percent and 53.8 percent, respectively, up from 45.2 percent and 44.3 percent last year and approaching the 75 percent threshold for admission. Only three players have reached 50 percent without eventually being admitted (Jack Morris, Gil Hodges, and Lee Smith).
“Cooperstown’s administrators – it is not run by Major League Baseball – and the writers-cum-gatekeepers must decide what the institution is. Its title – the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum – implies that the hall containing the players’ plaques is somehow apart from and other than the museum The Oxford English Dictionary defines ‘museum’ as a place where ‘objects of historical, scientific, artistic or cultural interest are stored and exhibited.’ A ‘shrine’ contains ‘memorabilia of a particular revered person or thing.’ Cooperstown stipulates that ‘voting shall be based upon the player’s record, playing ability, integrity, sportsmanship, character and contributions to the team(s) on which the player played.’
“Some players’ records reflect abilities enhanced by acts of bad character… But as younger writers who did not cover baseball during the PED era become Hall of Fame voters, the electorate is becoming less interested in disqualifying PED users. These writers should, however, consider why PEDs matter.
“They subvert the central idea of sport – athletes competing on equal terms….
“PEDs mock the idea that winning is a just reward for praiseworthy behavior… Drugs that make sport exotic make it less exemplary; they drain sport of admirable excellence, which elevates spectators as well as competitors.
“Beyond this civic interest in honest athletics, there is a matter of justice. Many former ballplayers missed having major league careers, or longer major league careers with larger contracts, because they competed honestly against cheating opponents, or lost playing time to cheating teammates. These handicapped-because-honorable players could have leveled the playing field only by using dangerous PEDs, thereby jeopardizing their physical and mental health and forfeiting their integrity.”
Mr. Will then brings up Fred McGriff, who hit 493 home runs in the steroid era, yet there has been zero suspicion McGriff ever used PEDs, yet this year he received just 21.7 percent of the vote and has only one year of eligibility left.
“If Cooperstown is content, as perhaps it should be, to be merely a museum – not a negligible thing – then Bonds and Clemens belong there as important elements of the game’s story, and their story should be candidly told on their plaques. If, however, Cooperstown wants admission to mean enshrinement, it must embrace and articulate the Hall’s ethic. America has never more urgently needed the insistence that real success must be honorably achieved.”
Great point, George.
So next year, Chipper Jones is among those on the ballot for a first time. He will receive in the 90s. But Jim Thome, Andruw Jones and Omar Vizquel are also on. Thome is going to be interesting. He is No. 7 on the all-time list with 612 homers, and there was never any broad discussion of PED use when his name came up, but I don’t think of him as Hall of Fame. That said, he’ll get in. Jones and Vizquel should as well, but it may take a few years.
–Slugger Mark Trumbo is returning with the Orioles next season. After hitting a league-leading 47 homers and driving in 108 runs, the 31-year-old outfielder was seeking a big deal, but settled for three years, $37.5 million, which is a relative bargain price if he can hit 30+ a year over the life of the contract.
–The Texas Rangers have agreed to a minor league contract with Josh Hamilton, with an invitation to spring training. He didn’t play at all last season after knee surgery, and his last full year was 2013.
–Finally, the baseball world received some awful news on Sunday, the death of 25-year-old Royals pitcher Yordano Ventura, killed in a car accident in his native Dominican Republic.
This is an all too common occurrence in the D.R. The same day, former major league infielder Andy Marte also died on a highway in the country.
In 2014, promising outfielder Oscar Taveras, a close friend of Ventura’s, died when he crashed in his hometown of Puerto Plata. He was just 22. Shortstop Andujar Cedeno died at age 31 in a 2000 crash.
As ESPN.com notes, a study by the World Health Organization found that the Dominican Republic had the highest traffic accident death rate in the Americas, with a rate of 29.3 per 100,000 in habitants.
Yordano Ventura was 38-31 in his brief career, but a real leader in the Royals’ World Series championship season of 2015, going 13-8, though he was less than that in the playoffs.
Of course this past September, the Miami Marlins’ Jose Fernandez was among three killed in a boating accident in Miami.
Premier League
Liverpool’s title hopes were dealt a huge blow on Saturday as they lost at home for the first time to lowly Swansea, 3-2; the Swans lifting themselves out of the basement at the same time.
My Tottenham Spurs traveled to Manchester City and emerged with a key draw, however it broke the Spurs’ six-game winning streak. It at least keeps them in the title conversation, if barely.
Tottenham was lucky, though. After falling behind 2-0 on two awful mistakes by their goalkeeper, Hugo Loris, they stormed back for the tie, but they were the beneficiaries of a major non-call on a push in the penalty area that should have given Man City a 3-1 lead.
In other matches of note, Everton beat Crystal Palace 1-0, CP now in deep trouble, while Manchester United could manage just a draw, 1-1, at Stoke City.
In this last one, Man U’s Wayne Rooney scored the lone goal on a superb free kick four minutes into stoppage time to save the day, his 250th with the club, thus becoming the all-time scorer, breaking the legendary Sir Bobby Charlton’s record of 249. Charlton was in attendance, a very cool moment, and afterwards the 79-year-old praised Rooney as “a true great for club and country.”
In Sunday’s contests….
Chelsea stayed firmly on top with a 2-0 win over Hull City. Arsenal took over sole second with a 2-1 win over Burnley. And Southampton added to defending champ Leicester City’s woes, whipping them 3-0.
Standings after 22 of 38 matches….
1. Chelsea 56 points
2. Arsenal 47
3. Tottenham 46
4. Liverpool 45
5. Man City 43
6. Man U 41
And in the battle to avoid relegation (last three sent packing)….
15. Leicester 21
16. Middlesbrough 20
17. Swansea 18…what a huge win yesterday
18. Crystal Palace 16
19. Hull 16
20. Sunderland 15
—Brazilian club Chapecoense played their first game since the tragic plane crash in Colombia that claimed 71 lives, including 19 players and staff.
The team recruited 22 new players and hosted Brazilian league champions Palmeiras in Saturday’s friendly.
The three players who survived the crash were in attendance, including the goalkeeper, who had his leg amputated.
Half of the match proceeds are going to the families of those killed, the rest will be used to rebuild the club. The road to recovery has officially begun for both the team and the city of Chapeco.
Stuff
–The spectacular Lindsey Vonn, in just the second race of her latest comeback from serious injury (knee and broken arm this time), edged the defending overall World Cup champion Lara Gut of Switzerland to win a downhill event on Saturday in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany, Vonn’s 77th career victory. Unreal. For good reason, after her run, knowing she had won, Lindsey “collapsed to the snow in celebration and shed tears of joy.”
I’ve said it many times before, but Lindsey Vonn is truly one of the greatest athletes of all time, male or female.
For her part, the great Lara Gut won the Super G today, Vonn ninth, as Gut has narrowed the deficit between herself and American Mikaela Shiffrin for the overall title, 1008 points (Shiffrin) to 873. [Shiffrin is almost solely slalom and GS.]
–I always watch the last few skaters for the U.S. Women’s Figure Skating championship. It’s the Saturday before the NFL conference championships, there is normally nothing else on, and the girls never fail to provide some drama as they not only attempt to be U.S. champ, but also make the roster for the World’s, which this year will go a long way in determining who then represents us for the Olympics next winter in South Korea.
So 17-year-old Karen Chen prevailed, just edging three-time champ Ashley Wagner, both performing beautifully. Mariah Bell was third, as two-time, and defending champ, Gracie Gold kind of, err….let’s just say it wasn’t her best night.
—Rick Hendrick, Richard Childress and Mark Martin were inducted into the NASCAR Hall of Fame Friday night.
Hendrick Motorsports has a NASCAR-leading 14 national titles – 11 in the top series with Jimmie Johnson, Jeff Gordon and Terry Labonte.
Mark Martin is considered the greatest driver never to win a championship, a runner-up five times for the Cup title, winning 40 races.
Childress, owner of Richard Childress Racing, started out as a driver in 1972, but gave it up in 1981 to focus on his team, with Dale Earnhardt winning six of his seven titles driving Childress cars. Earnhardt won 67 races for him, Childress having 11 total NASCAR titles as a car owner.
A tearful Childress spoke of Earnhardt.
“I wouldn’t be standing here tonight without him. He was a great friend and a huge loss to all of us and to our sport. I knew Dale for over 25 years. We spent 18 seasons together racing. I have so many great memories – winning our first championship, winning the Daytona 500, Indy, and many more. He’s a champion to all of his fans, his friends and his family.”
Also inducted was the late NASCAR champ from 1973, Benny Parsons, who died in 2007.
–Canberra, Australia: “A diver who was mauled by a 4-meter (13-foot) bull shark near the Great Barrier Reef was flown in stable condition to an Australian hospital for microsurgery to an arm, a paramedic said Sunday.
“The 55-year-old man had been free diving with friends in the Torres Strait from a boat chartered from the Queensland state city of Cairns when the shark attacked on Saturday afternoon.”
I’ve been to Cairns, and took a boat out to the Great Barrier Reef, but just ended up drinking a lot of beer and making new friends on a little resort offshore. No diving. Didn’t see any sharks. But we knew they were out there, sports fans!
In this case the bull shark came up from behind the man, who was 50 feet under water, and aside from severe injuries to his arm, he was bit in the stomach. Yikes.
I don’t know how this guy survived. Understand that he swam to the boat, and then the boat took three hours to reach the nearest medical center due to torrential rain, and then because of the weather, they weren’t able to chopper him off the island he landed on until the next day. I can’t imagine the pain…and shock of it all…though the BBC reported he was an inexperienced diver who had been attacked before.
–Also in Australia, a man was found dead after a suspected crocodile attack at the notorious Cahill’s Crossing in the Northern Territory, where he tried to walk across the East Alligator River in actions police have described as ‘foolish.’
You should look up photos of this place…easy to find. It’s fascinating, known for its fishing (barramundi) and incredibly dangerous. Only high-clearance four-wheel drive vehicles should make the crossing, but over the years people try to walk across, or take regular vehicles, and they “are tempting fate, knowing the size of the crocodiles in that area,” said NT Police Superintendent Bob Harrison.
The dead man was walking across with two woman, who made it to the other side, turned around and their friend was gone. His body was later recovered about 2 kilometers downstream, with a 11-foot croc nearby, which was immediately shot and killed. It’s assumed this was the offending animal. [Sydney Morning Herald]
By the way, crocodiles are protected in the Northern Territory and the population has exploded to 80,000 to 100,000.
—Great news on the All-Species front. Back in 1973, there was just one nesting pair of bald eagles in my state of New Jersey. The latest survey, as reported by Rajeev Dhir of the Star-Ledger, has revealed 172 nests, 11 more than in 2015. Among the nests monitored by the New Jersey Bald Eagle Project, 150 had eggs. A total of 216 new birds were born in 132 of those nests.
Most of the state’s eagles are in the south, the Delaware Bay region. I’m kind of hoping a pair would nest in the big tree across from my office. Invitation has been extended. Lots of mice, rats and grackles they can munch on. [Thankfully, I’ve been here seven years and never seen a rat, so hopefully the many hawks I espy every day are taking care of them before they knock on my door. My brother, who lives nearby, has grackle-killing hawks that leave ghastly messes in the yard. Real carnage…worse than the kind in America’s cities.]
–Speaking of birds…from Alison Gopnik of the Wall Street Journal:
“Shortly after I arrived at Oxford as a graduate student, intrigued by the new culture around me, I faced a very English whodunit. I had figured out how to get glass bottles of milk delivered to my doorstep – one of the exotic old-fashioned grace-notes of English domestic life. But every morning I would discover little holes drilled through the foil lids of the bottles.
“Waking up early one day to solve the mystery, I saw a pretty little English songbird, the Great Tit, using its beak to steal my cream. It turned out that around 1920, Great Tits had learned how to drill for cream, and for the next 50 years the technique spread throughout England. (Why the dairies never got around to changing the tops remains an English mystery.)
“How did these birds learn to steal? Could one bird have taught the others, like an ornithological version of the Artful Dodger in ‘Oliver Twist’? Until very recently, biologists would have assumed that each bird independently discovered the cream-pinching trick. Cultural innovation and transmission were the preserve of humans, or at least primates.”
But in a study out of Oxford of Great Tits, published in the journal Nature in 2015, with biologists fitting hundreds of the birds with transponder tags, like bird bar codes, to track the birds’ movements.
“Dr. (Lucy) Aplin showed the birds a feeder with a door painted half blue and half red. The birds lived in separate groups in different parts of the wood. Two birds from one group learned that when they pushed the blue side of the feeder from left to right, they got a worm. Another two birds from another group learned the opposite technique; they only got the worm when they pushed the red side from right to left. Then the researchers released the birds back into the wild and scattered feeders throughout the area….
“The researchers tracked which birds visited the feeders and at what time, as well as which technique they used. The wild birds rapidly learned by watching those trained in the lab. The blue-group birds pushed the blue side, while the red group pushed the red. And new birds who visited a feeder imitated the birds at that site, even though they could easily have learned that the other technique worked, too.”
This is remarkable, even more so because Great Tits don’t live long, “only about 40% of the birds survive to the next season. But though the birds had gone, their discoveries lived on. The next generation of the blue group continued to use the blue technique.”
So just as we’ve learned more about the intelligence of honeybees in recent years, this week we honor the Great Tit, who enters the All-Species List at No. 48.
‘Man’ moves up to 337 off his rescue work in Italy, aided by sniffer dogs, though we can’t move him higher due to further ISIS beheadings in Palmyra.
Top 3 songs for the week 1/26/74: #1 “You’re Sixteen” (Ringo Starr) #2 “Show And Tell” (Al Wilson…great tune…) #3 “The Way We Were” (Barbra Streisand…laaaa…)…and…#4 “”I’ve Got To Use My Imagination” (Gladys Knight & The Pips) #5 “The Joker” (Steve Miller Band) #6 “Love’s Theme” (Love Unlimited Orchestra) #7 “Smokin’ In The Boy’s Room” (Brownsville Station) #8 “Let Me Be There” (Olivia Newton-John) #9 “Time In A Bottle” (Jim Croce) #10 “Americans” (Byron MacGregor)
NBA Quiz Answer: No. 8 on the minutes per game for a season list at 46.01 is Nate ‘Tiny’ Archibald, 1972-73 with the Kansas City-Omaha Kings, a year in which he averaged 34.0 points per game. This year, LeBron James leads (in minutes per game) as of Saturday at 37.3.
Back to Wilt, he not only played virtually every minute of his career, he then had enough left to play the field after each game… cough cough…cough.
Next Bar Chat, Thursday.
